Meeting, Holding, Passing

Inspired by my previous commission, I struck out with the bold colours to develop another piece. This piece - Meeting, Holding, Passing - has been influenced by the transitory nature of friendships. People come together, interact on various levels and then separate, sometimes for a lifetime. For me at its simplest it represents two people meeting and then turning away. There are of course, many additional meanings that this piece can carry based on the viewer's experience and that is my intention.

This is made from glass strips fused together and mounted in stainless steel; ca. 350mm wide by 550mm high and 250 deep at the base.

Further detail view.

Sculpture Commission

Among the things to be done at Christmas time was to prepare a sculpture based on a previous one. This earlier piece - ca. 400 wide by 450 high and 150 deep - was formed from shaped strips that were fused and then shaped again before mounting in wood and steel.

In the case of this commission the client wanted a flat piece with a completely different colour scheme. It was one that is bolder than I normally commit to, but was completely appealing to me. The intention was to include various shades of red and green which can interact with each other. Depending on the viewpoint, each strip shades the colour of the next door strip.

This image gives the overall view of the piece. It is ca. 400mm wide by 330 high, mounted in wood and painted aluminum.

This image gives a detail of the piece showing a bit of the interaction of the colours.

What is important for me is that the client was delighted when she picked it up and was not worried at all by the delay.

Monolith Project

In the months leading up to Christmas - in addition to the usual pre- Christmas rush - I have been involved in a project lead byWestercraigs Nursery School. This has involved a whole community of children. Westercraigs, two primary schools and one Secondary school were part of the project, involving a whole campus of schools and beyond. Some of the people involved are shown here:

This shows some of the funders, the makers, and some of the designers - the children from 4 to 17 years of age.

The pieces designed by the children and made in the studio are to be inserted into rough sawn planks about 75mm thick with the bark remaining on the ends. The pieces made will be inserted into apertures cut into the planks. These planks will be set up around the nursery playground to enhance and define the outdoor space for the children.

We brought the children into the studio to tell them something about glass, how it is put together and then heated in the kiln - as we had decided early on that kiln formed pieces would suit the designs developed by the children. We sent the children away with some samples of coloured glass to help maintain their interest and attention.

After several visits to bring their designs and see progress on some others, we began to seriously produce the 26 pieces required for the project.

These images show some of the techniques used to interpret the designs given to us. In a few cases the older children made the panels from design to kiln.

The following images show some of the panels as interpreted. We tried to keep to the spirit and descriptions given to us by the children. It has been refreshing working with people who are interested in primary colours - contrast is important to them.

One of the pieces in the final two images is repeated as there was a failure in the first firing of it.